CARSON CITY, Mich. (WOOD) — A journey of a thousand miles begins with just a step. Sure. But what about 2,200 miles across 14 states, climbing and descending the equivalent of 16 Mount Everests?
Sound daunting? Not for Betty Kellenberger. At 80 years old, she recently became the oldest woman to ever hike the entire Appalachian Trail. Now, she is recovering from and reflecting on her latest adventure.
“You see incredible parts of our country, things that you wouldn’t see otherwise,” said Kellenberger as she relaxed in her living room, sitting in a chair positioned over a large rug displaying a map of her hike. “So much wildlife. It’s just gorgeous.”
Kellenberger grew up on a farm in Howell, Michigan. She says she was always fascinated by the idea of the footpath that ran continuously more than 2,000 miles from Georgia to Maine. It was always a dream, but she says there was never an opportunity to commit to the nearly six-month timeline.
“I always thought, ‘Oh, it would be so cool to hike on the Appalachian Trail.’ Of course, I thought I’d meet Daniel Boone, but it was just always there in the back of my mind,” she chuckled.
No stranger to endurance, Kellenberger put together an extensive teaching career spanning more than four decades. She taught mainly English and social studies to seventh graders, as well as night classes for adults.
Throughout her life, Kellenberger took on cross-country bicycling trips and extended hiking trips in the Canadian Rockies and Peru. Never married, with no kids, she said no one was stopping her from taking on a hike through more than a dozen states.
“As a consequence, I don’t have people hovering, saying, ‘We don’t think you should do this,’” said Kellenberger. “Makes it, for me, a whole lot easier.”
One thing making it tougher: recovering from a knee replacement surgery. Her doctor urged her to start simple.
“So I went to Harpers Ferry, aimed at the Shenandoahs — which is a fairly easy part of the trail — and started hiking,” explained Kellenberger. “And I could do it, with knee replacement, everything. So I just kept going.”
Kellenberger says she didn’t stress too much over the planning, gear preparation or logistics. Without the ability to train for climbing mountains in Michigan, she accepted the challenge of hiking her way into shape over the course of months on trail.
The Appalachian Trail Conservancy estimates between 3,000 and 4,000 attempt to hike the entire trail each year. Fewer than 25% make it the distance.
For Kellenberger, her first steps on the trail began in 2024 — a trek that she describes as far from easy.
“You dream during the day,” she described with a smile. “You dream of food and you dream of what can I get out of this pack? What can make it lighter? Because it’s got to go up every mountain and it’s got to come down every mountain.”
Kellenberger battled dehydration, a concussion from a nasty fall and Lyme disease, ultimately making it to the southern Virginia border before Mother Nature halted progress altogether, ravaging the eastern United States with Hurricane Helene.
“Helene just devastated that area of the South,” she recalled.
Kellenberger managed to change her route northbound until the cold weather delayed her hike until the spring of 2025. As she worked through New England during the 2025 hiking season, Kellenberger said she began to hear rumblings that she was set to become the oldest woman to complete the trail.
The women’s age record previously belonged to Linda Vanderloop, who finished the trail in 2024 at age 74. Kellenberger says she didn’t set out on the Appalachian Trail with the goal of becoming the oldest woman thru-hiker.
“You have to plant your feet, look at the view and then move forward every step,” she explained. “You have to be focused.”
More than 2,000 miles of walking offered her a chance to focus inward.
“You hike alone, and so you have your thoughts and you have time, and you have, you know, the presence of God and all that magnificent scenery, but it’s the people you meet. It’s the shuttlers. It’s the folks that were hiking with you.”
The experience culminated in an emotional finish.
“So you’re a basket case. You have so many emotions because you’re excited about finishing,” she recalled. “I was really looking forward to saying, ‘I am done.’ But you also know you’re going to miss this big-time. You’re not going to have what you have out on that trail. That peace, the serenity.”
Kellenberger highlighted Maine and New Hampshire as the toughest, but most beautiful stretches of the trail. One of her favorite memories from the trail includes seeing a full-grown adult moose in the backcountry of Maine’s wilderness.
Now, having completed one tough challenge, her next hurdle is adjusting back into society.
“This life is a journey. And it may be a series of little journeys. Or maybe just the whole life is a journey,” she said. “And the bigger your efforts, the greater the reward.”
Kellenberger now holds the title of the oldest woman to complete the entire trail. She says the hike has her in the best shape of her life, even after the knee replacement and all the bumps and bruises along the way. Up next for her: hiking in Iceland and perhaps taking on the North Country Trail.
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